# Who started 'Anno Domini'?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 11, 2002, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511 "2002-07-11T22:42:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![garcolga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/aca169/32.png) [@garcolga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garcolga)\
**Post date:** [July 11, 2002, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511/1 "2002-07-11T22:42:09Z")

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When did the term ‘Anno Domini’ come into use to indicate dates?

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**Author:** ![jimmmy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/73ab20/32.png) [@jimmmy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimmmy)\
**Post date:** [July 11, 2002, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511/2 "2002-07-11T23:39:12Z")

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The first historian or chronicler to use A.D. as his primary dating mechanism was the Anglo-Saxon monk Bede, in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, published around 730.

[http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Anno+Domini](http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Anno+Domini)

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**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\
**Post date:** [July 12, 2002, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511/3 "2002-07-12T03:46:09Z")

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I thought that the dating of the birth of Christ (and hence of the use of “in the year of Our Lord”) was due to Dionysus Exiguus (“Dennis the Short”) a fw hundred years earlier.

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**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\
**Post date:** [July 12, 2002, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511/4 "2002-07-12T06:24:06Z")

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If you read the linked article, it does credit the invention of the Anno Domini system to Dionysius Exiguus, in the middle of the 6th century. The later chronicler Bede popularized it.

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**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\
**Post date:** [July 12, 2002, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-started-anno-domini/118511/5 "2002-07-12T07:45:45Z")

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Somehow that link isn’t working for me. But anyway,

> [@](#):
>
> **From _Calendar_ by David Ewing Duncan, pp. 74-75:**  
> Dionysius [Exiguus] was the first ever to use the system we all now take for granted when he wrote on his Easter tables _anni Domini nostri Jesu Christi_ (the years of our Lord Jesus Christ) 532–627.

and

> [@](#):
>
> **From _Marking Time_ by Duncan Steel, p. 108:**  
> Dionysius did not call that year _anno Domini_ 532, although many later accounts give that impression.

So who’s right? Dunno, but taken together, it may be that Dionysius first coined the term, but Bede codified it into a counting system later. Even then, it took a while to achieve widespread use, as some parts of Spain did not adopt it until the 14th Century (Duncan, p. 75). Off-the-topic WAG: probably had to do with the Moorish population there.

Wanna know more? B.C. was not used as a counting system for pre-A.D. years until Dionysius Petavius argued for its use in 1627. Well, actually, he advocated the term _ante Christum_ — the alternative _ante Domini_ being confusing — rather than the modern English _before Christ_. (Steel, p. 114 and Duncan, p. 75) Anyway, this means A.D. actually came before B.C.

I don’t know why there are so many Duncans and Dionysiuses involved in this business. Must be a secret rule or something.